THE APPEAL OF THE (HIGH) ROAD LESS TRAVELLED: WHY MORAL ACTIONS BECOME MORE APPEALING WHEN NO ONE ELSE DOES THEM A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF BUSINESS AND THE COMMITTEE ON GRADUATE STUDIES OF STANFORD UNIVERSITY IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Kieran O’Connor June, 2013 © 2013 by Kieran Sean O'Connor. All Rights Reserved. Re-distributed by Stanford University under license with the author. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution- Noncommercial 3.0 United States License. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/us/ This dissertation is online at: http://purl.stanford.edu/fv068qv2135 ii I certify that I have read this dissertation and that, in my opinion, it is fully adequate in scope and quality as a dissertation for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Elizabeth Mullen, Primary Adviser I certify that I have read this dissertation and that, in my opinion, it is fully adequate in scope and quality as a dissertation for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Benoit Monin, Co-Adviser I certify that I have read this dissertation and that, in my opinion, it is fully adequate in scope and quality as a dissertation for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Francis Flynn I certify that I have read this dissertation and that, in my opinion, it is fully adequate in scope and quality as a dissertation for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Dale Miller Approved for the Stanford University Committee on Graduate Studies. Patricia J. Gumport, Vice Provost Graduate Education This signature page was generated electronically upon submission of this dissertation in electronic format. An original signed hard copy of the signature page is on file in University Archives. iii iv Abstract Previous research has documented the power of descriptive norms to increase prosocial behavior, but has largely neglected the possibility of uniqueness as a motivator of prosocial behavior. Although theories of normative influence predict that social information indicating that a behavior is rare will dissuade others from taking action, I predict that low rates of prosocial behavior can be particularly motivating, prompting prosocial action on par with descriptively normative behavior. Study 1 explores the real experiences of unique behavior among entrepreneurial chefs through a series of qualitative interviews. Results from Studies 2 and 3 suggest that counter- normative social information increases individuals’ willingness to engage in prosocial behavior relative to a baseline condition. Further, Studies 4 and 5 explored divergent psychological mechanisms responsible for descriptively normative and counter- normative social influence. Results from Study 4 suggest that while individuals spurred to behave prosocially when it is normative to do so experience no positive benefit to their self-worth because that behavior is common, individuals who engage in counter-normative prosocial behavior show increases in the perceived identity centrality of those behaviors because that behavior is distinctive. Consistent with this psychology, results from Study 5 reveal that individuals who have engaged in counter- normative prosocial behavior do so as an identity opportunity rather than from feelings of obligation, and these individuals express more pride than those whose prosocial behavior is more common. Thus, individuals who are motivated to take rare prosocial action, but not those motivated to take common prosocial action, may do so because they foresee the opportunity of a prospective enhancement to their self-worth. v Acknowledgements I would like to thank my Co-Advisors, Elizabeth Mullen and Benoît Monin, for their generous and encouraging guidance throughout each phase of this project; Frank Flynn, Dale Miller, Jonathan Levav, Lee Ross, and Robert Cialdini for helpful feedback; individuals who were willing to share their time and experience for Study 1, including Anthony Mangieri, Anthony Myint, Karen Leibowitz, Charlie Ayers, Chris Cosentino, Craig Stoll, Kermit Lynch, Patama Gur, and Robyn Sue Fisher; the generous support of The John E. and Barbara D. Wertin Fellowship, The Harold J. Leavitt PhD Fellowship, The Charlie and Jean Smith Fellowship, The Sarah H. Crampton Fellowship, The Robert E. Gross Lockheed Aircraft Corporation Fellowship, and The G. Cal Setzer Fellowship. In particular, I would also like to thank Tess Garton and my family for their unending and gracious support throughout this process. vi Table of Contents Abstract iv Introduction 1 Overview of Studies 11 Study 1 15 Study 2 33 Study 3 38 Study 4 43 Study 5 53 General Discussion 62 Appendix 70 References 72 vii List of Tables Table 1. List of interviewed chefs and leaders in the food and wine industry, Study 1. Table 2. Types of prosocial behavior by normative and counter-normative contexts, Study 5. viii Little by little I feel like you can force the world to adapt to what you are doing. If you are doing something honest and true and pure, and if you are doing it for the right intentions, in the end, long run success is undeniable, if not monetarily, you can find it in your soul. Anthony Mangieri, Pizzaiolo Una Pizza Napoletana 1 The Appeal of the (High) Road Less Traveled: Why Moral Actions Become More Appealing When No One Else Does Them When others fail to engage in ethical behavior, how does it influence our own actions—specifically, are we more or less likely to engage in prosocial behavior after we see others fail to do so? For example, when leaving a grocery store, are we more or less likely to drop a donation into the Salvation Army box if we have just witnessed other shoppers pass by with their hands in their pockets; are we more or less likely to walk the extra block to compost our lunch container if we observe the rest of our dining companions throw their containers in the landfill waste bins; and, are we more or less likely to sign a sidewalk petition in support of gay marriage if we see others tell the volunteer they are too busy? In all of these examples, our own decisions to engage in prosocial behavior may be influenced by the prior behavior of our peers. Whereas past research on social and normative influence suggests that our peers’ failure to behave morally will make our own subsequent ethical behavior less likely, I propose that a divergent prediction is also sometimes true: that others’ failure to behave ethically may sometimes inspire us to a nobler course of action. Further, I suggest that individuals take advantage of these situations to be morally unique precisely because they offer an opportunity to increase their own sense of being a good, moral person (i.e., their own self-worth; Steele, 1988). On the one hand, descriptive normative social influence1 may compel 1 Researchers have distinguished between informational social influence (i.e., “information obtained from another as evidence about reality,” p. 629) and normative social influence (i.e., “influence to conform with the positive expectations of another” p. 629; Deutsch & Gerard, 1955). Most important for the present paper, within normative social influence, researchers have distinguished between two 2 individuals to act out of feelings of obligation or social responsibility (e.g., “I am more likely to recycle because others are doing it”). However, such high-consensus ethical behavior affords little opportunity to feel an increase in one’s moral self-worth simply because many others have taken similar action. On the other hand, when individuals are unique in their prosocial behavior, they may experience a boost in their self-image as a good person because their behavior is distinctive. It is for this latter reason that I suspect individuals are at times more likely to engage in prosocial behavior when their peers have failed to do so. Specifically, our model predicts that when individuals (a) learn that an unambiguously desirable behavior is rare among their peers, they will (b) foresee increased self-worth they could gain if they were one of few, if any, to perform that behavior, which will thereby (c) increase the likelihood that they will engage in that behavior. To be clear, I hypothesize that the opportunity to enhance one’s self- worth by performing uncommon ethical behavior will fulfill individuals’ unidirectional drive to see themselves as good, moral people (Festinger, 1954; Steele, 1988). Although individuals may also be motivated by the possibility that others will see them as such, I predict that individuals’ motives to see themselves positively will be sufficient to produce these effects (i.e., they are not driven by self-presentation). Following the Crowd: When Peer Behavior Reduces Social Action Social influence findings suggest that individuals will be more likely to engage in a particular action the more that similar others also engage in that action (Goldstein, types of norms: Descriptive norms describe behaviors that are perceived to be typical (e.g., what others tend to do); Injunctive norms describe behaviors that are typically approved and disapproved (e.g., what others think ought to be done) (Cialdini, 2003; Cialdini, Reno, & Kallgren, 1990). In the present paper, I use the term normative social influence to indicate whether our hypotheses and manipulations refer specifically to behavior that is descriptively normative (e.g., others are doing it), or counter-normative (e.g., few others are doing it), but maintain that the behavior in both cases is something that individuals would consider right, appropriate, and good themselves. 3 Cialdini, & Griskevicius, 2008), such as households who increased recycling behavior when they learned that it was descriptively normative to do so (see Footnote 1; e.g., Schultz, Nolan, Cialdini, Goldstein, & Griskevicius, 1999), and hotel guests who were more likely to re-use their towels if they learned that many similar others had also done so (Goldstein, et al., 2008).